Friday, October 13, 2017

Cassette Review: Vlimmer "lllllll" (Blackjack Illuminist Records)

On this, the seventh installment in the Vlimmer EP series, we find a sound which is familiar to us from Vlimmer but also some new aspects can be heard coming out through the music. It begins with these loud booms and then as the vocals kick in there is a rather religious type of feeling to it. It's not just the organs that come in but mostly that I think of it as being like that "Take Me To Church" song though it doesn't really sound similar it just has that same sort of presence.

A different type of synth comes out next. There are these background screams in here but it doesn't get quite as heavy as previously heard on the sixth EP. It reminds me a bit of Stabbing Westward. It also takes on this haunting sort of vibe with this Nine Inch Nails darkness that descends into a soundtrack of some sort that I just can't quite put my finger on but possibly the first "Crow" movie. (The Nine Inch Nails songs it reminds me of though span from "Pretty Hate Machine" era to "The Great Below")

Through sounds that remind me of Thursday without the -core and even something Xiu Xiu might have made in the 1980's/early 1990's, Vlimmer once again manages to create an EP full of songs that you can hear and think "Yeah, that's Vlimmer" but at the same time they are not the same songs over and over again, as many lesser artists would do.